What a great opening  I love a bit of nudity in my shows. Which is why I liked Californication so much, I suppose. Just let me pause this for a moment and enjoy the view. Aaaaahhhhh, that’s nice. Apparently it’s the George Washington University Extension Program  so what is it exactly that they’re extending? Enquiring minds want to know… Apparently sitting still and modelling like that is quite difficult. I can imagine the cramps. Still, I don’t have enough sympathy for this young man to want him to move just yet (how long can you pause DVDs without damage?). He’s rather a sight to behold  tanned skin, long, dark, curly hair, nice muscles…. sorry, I drifted off for a moment there. I’m now officially a dirty old woman. Moving on…

Oh, it really is an art class. There are lots of students beavering away at their interpretations of “Nude Man on a very small stool” and I take a moment to reflect how jealous I am of anyone with talent in the visual arts. I can’t even draw stick people well. Mark Snow’s Theme of Impending Creepiness is yawing about on the soundtrack, so I’m sure there will be some sort of reveal soon (I mean on top of the reveal we’ve already had…and now I’m just digging myself in deeper, aren’t I?). Now the camera has focused on a bug-eyed man with very short hair who seems to have a very different interpretation of the life drawing from everyone else. He’s a sweaty sort of individual who needs a shave and some very strong sort of soap. He looks as if he smells a bit. He has a rather odd way of holding his pencil (not that I’m an expert) and he is staring so intensely at the model that Nude Man on a very small stool is getting a bit creeped-out by it. Ugh, a close-up of his buggy eyes. I’m certain it’s not natural to have that much white showing and we’re so close in you can see the individual blood vessels. Yuck. Mark Snow gives us an audio prod and we see that Creepy Sweaty Guy is actually drawing some sort of gargoyle, and it’s clear that even the insane are much more artistically talented than I am. Sigh. CSG is working so intently on his drawing that he breaks the pencil, so he has to use his Exacto knife to resharpen it, but cuts his finger instead, causing blood to flow. He just looks at it for a moment, then goes right back to work, incorporating the blood into the picture. They call that mixed media, don’t they?

All of a sudden, the art class is over. The instructor covers up the model with a blanket (aaawwww) and tells everyone that they’re done for the night. Creepy Sweaty Guy throws all of his equipment into a wooden case and quickly puts on his coat. He’s in some sort of a hurry. He pushes past his classmates, ignoring them when they complain and the instructor and the model watch him leave. CSG’s outside now, pauses for a minute to look around furtively, then scurries off into the night. The camera pulls back and up and focuses on a stone gargoyle perched on the roof of the building.

Now we see an alleyway and there’s a hulking shadow on the wall, but fake-out! It’s only no-longer Nude model returning to his car. I don’t think there’s a woman alive who would be foolish enough to park in such a dark, deserted place, but I suppose if you’re young and muscular, or if you carry a gun, you probably wouldn’t think much about it. He’s about to get into the car (some sort of low-slung sporty thing, but a bit old), and he hears a noise. As he fumbles for his car-keys, we get a shot of someone’s hand, outlined in that blue-steel lighting that TV shows use for night. Ruh-roh, someone’s shoved an art pencil in the door lock of the car. I’d be really pissed off right now  parts for that sort of car are going to be hard to get and expensive. We see a sudden flash of Exacto knife, then a masculine scream (not girly). It’s so dark you can’t really see anything else.

Alarm clock buzzing, and it wakes up Creepy Sweaty Guy, who looks like he has a horrible headache and is in need of a shower. Bang  his door is kicked in and there’s a group of men yelling, “FBI!” and they proceed to arrest CSG, reading him his rights. They’re all heavily armed and are toting flashlights as they haul him out of bed and he yells incoherently and scrabbles at the floor. They handcuff him and pull him to his feet and the camera swings back for a close-up of Kurtwood Smith, one of my favourite character actors. You young’uns will recognise him as Red Foreman from That 70s Show, but I remember him most fondly as Clarence Boddicker in Robocop, a truly evil son-of-a-bitch. CSG bites one of the arresting agents and is bundled outside while Kurtwood snaps on the latex and begins to examine the unusual wallpaper until his gaze lights upon the art supplies shoved underneath a small table. He picks up the Exacto knife and pushes the blade up. Dun dun DUHHHNNNN! It’s all bloody! Cue old-school titles  the Truth is Out There - still. That’s sort of comforting.

Slideshow! It’s the mug shot of Creepy Sweaty Guy, whose name we now learn is John Mostow, divorced, with no children. Mulder’s monotone drawls out all the information about Mostow, who is from Uzbekistan and spent time in a mental institution there. Don’t worry Mulder, I’m sure your time will come to experience the thrill of five-point restraints and anti-psychotic medication. Scully is reading the file, and is dressed in what appears to be a rust-coloured skirt suit. Apparently CSG has been killing young men, but there’s no evidence of sexual assault, death being caused by massive blood loss due to facial mutilation. As Mulder talks about the wound pattern, he makes this funny sort of circular hand motion around his own face that cracks me up a bit. He really wants to leave the FBI and interview for Vanna White’s job. Mulder changes the slide as Scully reads out the litany of abuse and she gasps a little at the bloody sight that we can only see from side on because we’re the audience and some of us might become unbalanced if we saw anything so horrifying. She tells us that the level of violence and overkill suggest the work of a very angry individual. Mulder’s sitting at his desk with his foot up  while Scully seems more than a little rattled by these goings-on, he seems totally relaxed. Must be that profiling BSU background. His tie is rather subdued and tasteful, especially compared to other examples we’ve seen on this show. It’s in differing diagonal stripes of blue, with a white stripe for contrast. Perhaps Scully chose it for him this morning and he was so sated from the night before that he didn’t have the strength to argue. Or was that a fanfic I read? Anyway, he looks rather delish.